Steve Benen: That ought to be interesting: “President Obama will fly to Cleveland hours after the Iowa caucuses for an address on the economy, the White House announced Monday. Obama will travel to the Ohio city aboard Air Force One on Wednesday and will deliver remarks on the economy at Shaker Heights High School. His remarks will come shortly after Hawkeye State voters kick off the 2012 presidential nominating race.”

****

Republican presidential candidate Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and her husband Marcus sing and pray while attending services at the Jubilee Family Church on January 1, 2012 in Oskaloosa, Iowa

:???:

*****

Clean Technica: With two years of the Obama administration, almost four times as much clean energy has been put on the grid on public lands as in all the previous 40 years.

All the renewable energy ever permitted on public lands totaled 1,800 MW by the end of 2008. In the last two years, the Department of the Interior has approved 6,600 MW of new projects.

A crying, blubbering joke. If Rs are stupid enough to nominate him, Willard will probably walk out of the debates with the President when it’s made even more obvious to viewers that he’s dumber than dirt.

Is Randi back? I didn’t listen today because I can not deal with nicole sandler. When she subbed last week she introduced one of her guests as “one of us, a progressive”, she downplays President Obama’s accomplishments as “not enough, not fast enough, didn’t go far enough”, I thought she was going to literally cream her jeans when DWS made her statement about the NDAA. She crowed about it the rest of the show, like it was a major indictment on the president. When did progs become a separate group outside the Democratic umbrella, like the group in Iowa? Are they becoming like the tea party, an off shoot of our party. I don’t get that whole purity progressive attitude. What is the difference in what we as Dems want for the country and what they want? Is this just another way to cause dissent, which is not needed coming into 2012. I really want to understand this “new” group.

I can’t stand her. I wish Randi would not allow Sandler to sub for her— Randy hates whiners and Sandler is one of the biggest. Whenever I hear her whiny voice, I can’t turn the station fast enough. :roll:

I’ll have to check her show on a repeat since she’s back now. I love hearing Randi and miss her when she’s gone.

It’s called “racism”. PBO, an African American, can’t really be better than a white person at being president. YES HE CAN, and this white 56 yr old woman is crowing about this!!! Way to go President Obama, best president ever!

David Sirota drops a drive-by tweet and suggests that the Democrats’ Drug War, Patriot Act & Indefinite Detention Bill* are more racist than Ron Paul’s newsletters and doesn’t answer as Tweeters take him down.

*Um, the Drug War & Patriot Act are Republican concoctions & there is no “Indefinite Detention Bill.”

I saw Sirota on Howard Kurtz’s CNN sunday show “Reliable Sources.” and he kept on suggesting that Paul’s racist newsletters weren’t all that bad. He was slightly more angry at the anti-gay slurs but brushed aside the racial slurs about African-Americans as though they were just a slap on the wrist. I ouldn’t believe my ears. It was disgusting. The conservative guest raked Paul over the coals for the disgusting newsletters while Sirota tried to slyly promote Paul’s causes.

At the end of the day, these emoprogs and PL have one underlying commonality: They’re pissed that an African-American is the President of the United States.

Yes, Indeed, UT! If David Sirota and other neo-progressives think that opposing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is really not that important, then they are telling us that they would prefer to go back to the Jim Crow era. By calling themselves progressives means absolutely nothing to me if they have no problem supporting an advocate of Jim Crow who pretends to hide behind the claim of protecting property rights. History teaches us that this is exactly what happened when the so called progressive Republicans abandoned Blacks, during the Reconstruction period, and facilitated the the triumph of White Supremacy in the South. It was the restoration of White Supremacy in the South, following the brief period of Reconstruction, that ushered in the vicious period of the Jim Crow period, which lasted over ninety years. If David Sirota thinks that Ron Paul’s racism and opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 should be overlooked, then I have no problem calling Sirota a racist apologist! Sirota’s approach is basically the MO of the neo-progressives. It is as if they are ready to discard the most loyal segment of the Democratic party: the African Americans. Since 1960, no other segment of the Democratic coalition has been as loyal as the African American community. From 1960 to the present, African Americans have overwhelmingly voted for the Democratic party (80-95%). JFK, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama would never have been elected President if it weren’t for the overwhelming vote of African Americans. LBJ would never have enjoyed a historical landslide victory if it weren’t for the AA votes. Even the loosing Democratic candidates (McGovern, Mondel, Dukakis, Gore and Kerry) received over 80% of the AA votes. Yet, people like David Sirota have no qualms dismissing the interests of African Americans.

Just saw the Obama Iowa chair Jenn Psaki I think her name was on Hardball. I was very impressed by her the NYT reporter Zeleny was saying that the “jenn may not want to admit it, but the campaign has a tough battle in Iowa against Romney”. Jenn kept her cook, she was calm and collected and she was never off message and she came off as personable, she knew her audience and she knew her talking points. She hit them all. Then Tweety showed video of the guy who willing to do press about how Mittens and Bain capitol really destroy families and jobs and that guy came off as very credible.

It just showed me that the Obama team is on the ball, even if faux-gressive “supporters” are distracted by the bright flash that is Ron Paul.

The one consequence of a long primary in GOP is that I think other Dems don’t want to target the GOP until the nominee is known, but I know the Obama team is having none of that!

I see each newly favored GOP candidate come to the surface with almost enthusiastic polling support, then quickly plummet when the truth about the candidate is found out. I worry that the GOP will put a last minute candidate into the fight at their convention (brokered convention) instead of Romney and capture that not enough time to check them out phenomenum along with the voter suppression laws, and the Citizens United ability for corporations to fire off endless negative untruthful ads and steel the election. I pray that doesn’t happen and will work to educate the public against this tactic.

I saw that….I laughed out loud when she said there were OBAMA SUPPORTERS there and Tweety, that they were hardball supporters and then he asked who were OBAMA SUPPORTERS and boy did he have to “eat cake” with “egg” all over his funny face…HA!

Just read the Daily Beast article—-and other than the few familiar irritating observances, it was very interesting. There’s a Mighty Operation at work there in Chicago——200+ hard at work, doing everything possible—–everything known to man and machine—-to pave the road to re-election.

Operation is crazy already. I understand why they allow the peak in, so people can see where their money is going and the like, but at the same time I’d probably wall off the tech team completely from any prying eyes of the press – or at least have them flat out lie about what they are doing.

There are certainly ways to disagree with Obama administration policies without ad hominem attacks on Barack Obama the man or those who chose to support him. Saying those supporters would condone the president “raping a nun on live TV” not being among them.

Unfortunately, that was the approach taken by Salon.com blogger Glenn Greenwald over the weekend, while expressing his outrage over President Obama signing the National Defense Authorization Act.

The annual NDAA is the essential piece of legislation that pays U.S. soldiers’ salaries, funds equipment for troops overseas, buys ammunition, and also pays our military contractors abroad.

……………………………

Greenwald has been one of the loudest and harshest critics of the Obama administration, and while not actually a liberal or an Obama supporter, he is frequently identified as a blogger who is “disappointed with President Obama” over what he sees as serious violations of civil liberties. The debate over the NDAA (and U.S. drone attacks in Pakistan) has been ongoing and frequently gets lively between Greenwald and his supporters, and pro-Obama bloggers like Imani Gandy, of AngryBlackLady.com and Balloon Juice (Gandy also contributes to theGrio.)

Is Mr. Greenwald having fantasies about the President. Hey Glenn – it’s okay. I’m sure many folks can relate. You don’t have to go overboard hating the President in a desperate attempt to squelch your latent pinings….

Man, Republicans hate food stamps and social security—–just saw Santorum spit out those words like they were the most horrible, shameful programs in the history of the world. The other Repubs have also joined in their hate of our historic protection programs. What kind of a hellish country do they want?

Private Danny Chen, and why I will never again reach out to OWS about something that matters to me

By Guest Contributor Esther Choi, cross-posted from Some Thoughts …

I can’t stress enough that the following article only represents my opinions as an individual, and are not to be affiliated with any other person, organization or community.

December 15, 2011
Tonight was the march and vigil for Private Danny Chen, who was killed in the army on October 3, 2011. We don’t know how he died. The army is withholding all evidence, which it owes to the family, that could answer this question. What we do know is that he did not die in combat. We know he was constantly harassed and discriminated against by his fellow soldiers for being Chinese. We know some really twisted, violent hazing was committed against him by his superiors, right before he was found dead. We decided to hold a march and vigil because the army is currently carrying out an investigation, and we have to show them that the public is watching and that they cannot get away with another cover-up.

Just yesterday, board members of OCA-NY along with Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez and Council Member Margaret Chin went to the Pentagon to meet with high-ranking army officials, where they made demands that may fundamentally transform the way that hazing and bias crimes are dealt with in the military. We need them to know that the public and the media are watching, and that if they do not meet our demands, we will redirect our campaign to focus on our young men and women who are thinking of enlisting. These young people need to know before they enlist, the Army will not protect them from harm by fellow soldiers.

This is a sad story. I had written a whole paragraph about OWS, but they’ve co-opted too many righteous causes already. I hope this family finds out the truth about what happened to this military family member. And I hope OWS gets a clue.

You all know what I think of OWS. But more importantly, I hope the Pentagon comes clean with the information. Covering shit up doesn’t work and it doesn’t help the victim’s family, the men and women of our armed forces nor does it help our country. Stuff like this makes my skin crawl.

Here’s something you might enjoy out of Iowa. A couple of techies really annoyed at what the Repubs are doing to the reputation of sane Iowans. In case my attempt at linking doesn’t work, it’s on YouTube under the title of: “Think you know Iowa? Think again!” by hapjak53. Runs 2 minutes. BEWARE it IS an in-your-face style with about three f-bomb-type expletives. It’s flying around facebook across the state. Chips, dear, hope I’m not violating our site protocol by recommending this…

Campaigning in Iowa today, Mitt Romney took a relatively new tack in going after President Obama, characterizing the president as having promised to be a savior to the entire planet.

“I’ve been watching some clips of President Obama, then candidate Obama, when he was going across Iowa four years ago,” Romney said. “And the promises were just non-stop of all the great thing he was going to do: heal the nation, bring us together, repair the nation and repair the world.”

I watched the 2008 race pretty closely, and I’m fairly certain Obama never promised he’d single-handedly “repair the world.” What’s more likely is that Romney, an enthusiast of “post-truth politics,” simply made this up. He does that a lot.

But as lies go, this one is fairly important because of what it tells us about the larger Republican strategy. Peter Wallsten has a good piece today on the literal GOP playbook.

LISA, how you make me spit out the last of my tea? It was perfect, I was savoring it, reading my TOD… Now I gotta clean off my desk, get up and boil some more water and take the honey back out of the cabinet. DAMN.

To responsibly end the Iraq War, prevent a second Depression, pass Healthcare reform where every President before him had failed, repeal Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, and kill Osama Bin Laden.
Check, Check, check, check, CHECK.

What gets me about these so-called “Christians” is that they deride hope, love, unity, brotherliness, faith, community, empathy, compassion and a whole slew of other words that are supposed to describe the Christian life. This attack from Romney is just mean-spirited and cynical. The fact is, the world is much happier since President Obama took over, and much more optimistic, too. World leaders look like they actually enjoy spending time in each other’s company and working together to solve problems. People are tasting freedom around the world,and rolling up their sleeves to do the hard work of building their democracies. Children have a real role model for leadership,family values, goodness and humanity in the First Family. It’s the right wing (and left wing) cynics who keep telling us to be unhappy, hopeless, pessimistic, and doomed. It’s pathetic. The GOP is pathetic. Romney is pathetic.

Well said, Theo! A friend of mine who, unlike me, is really religious and knows the Bible intimately says that if Jesus Christ re-appeared to day the right wing Republican Christians would loudly and viciously denounce him.

Religion Plays Major Role in Iowa Caucuses
By Emmanuel Parisse | Posted at January 2, 2012, 8:12 am

The Reverend Gordon, who supports the candidacy of Santorum, talks about the need to send a message not only to America, but to the rest of world, about America’s values. In his television interviews and campaign speeches, Santorum has hammered home the message of rejection of gay marriage, and of abortion — even in cases of rape.

Conservative Christians represent a key constituency in Iowa and other US states, where Republican primaries will be held until almost mid-year. A report by the Institute for the Study of American Evangelicals estimated that the share of evangelical Christians in the United States is about 30 percent to 35 percent of the population, or around 100 million people.

Drilling The Big GOP Lie: The US Exports More Gasoline Than It Imports
By Ray Medeiros| January 2, 2012

The Republicans have told the American people that we need to drill for more oil, build refineries and build pipelines all in the name of energy independence. Yet as CNBC pointed out in December of 2011, the United States is EXPORTING more refined fuel, gasoline, than it imports for the first time in 50 years.

“For all refined petroleum products, the U.S. in the first 10 months of 2011 exported 848 million barrels and imported 750 million. Lipow said he believes this if the first time since World War II that the U.S. will be a net exporter of refined petroleum products, but government data on the EIA website only goes back to 1973.”

While Fox News continues to dominate the news market in ratings (while losing out to Jon Stewart), they were also the only cable news network to actually see their numbers decline in 2011:

~snip~

An 8% loss for prime time translates to a lot of money for the big advertising time slots. It would be interesting to see a deeper analysis of what could be the cause here. Fox has maintained the same prime time line-up for quiet awhile now, so perhaps people are just getting tired of hearing the same old Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity. On the other hand, perhaps people are just finally getting tired of being spoon fed a bunch of b.s.?

Their viewers are dying off. I predict Fox viewer numbers’ downward trend is going to continue throughout the next four years. Ditto with the Tea Partiers, for that matter. Both preach to an older demographic.

Well, from what I read those folks did not follow ko…he is only geting 200,000 viewers…I too hope that the downward trend is a strong indicator that msm “will become irrelevant”…maybe their BIG heads will shrink, also!

That is no doubt one reason. Another is folks using the internet more for their information and relying on networks less. Also Fox’s reputation as a far right propaganda outfit is catching on – and I’m sure not helped by their embrace of the tea party and Sarah Palin now that both are polling 30% favorability.

Fox still leads by a pretty big margin in all head-to-heads, but an 8% drop combined with a 17% CNN bump is a 25% swing to the competition. Of course CNN is moving more right, so they could be peeling off a share of Fox viewers. Fox offers nothing but GOP propaganda/Obama hate. CNN offers that, but also has opposing views and thus is seen as more straight up news.

As part of an aggressive Republican “war on voting,” GOP policymakers in much of the country are putting new hurdles between Americans and their election process. The most common — and arguably most odious — are mandatory voter-ID laws, intended to block traditional Democratic constituencies (African Americans, students, the poor, the elderly) from participating in elections.

When defending the voter-suppression tactics, Republican invariably say the measures are necessary to prevent imaginary voter fraud. But it’s interesting to see when those concerns disappear.

Speculation is reportedly mounting that charges against ousted Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak could be dismissed as his trial resumes in Cairo. Mubarak, 83, is charged with corruption and involvement in the deaths of more than 800 protesters during the uprising that toppled his 29-year regime last year. His sons Gamal and Alaa are simultaneously on trial, as are Mubarak’s former security chief and six top police commanders, charged with giving orders to kill protesters in Tahrir Square during the 18-day uprising, during which about 850 people were killed and more than 1,000 injured..

We talked earlier about a fascinating exchange during last night’s “60 Minutes” on CBS, when Lesley Stahl noted that Reagan raised taxes and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s press secretary threw a fit. It appears my post wasn’t well received by some on the right.

To briefly recap, Stahl and Cantor were talking about the nature of political compromises, and the CBS correspondent noted that Reagan, Cantor’s hero, was willing to compromise and the Republican icon “raised taxes.” Cantor’s press secretary, off camera, interrupted the interview, yelling that Stahl was lying about Reagan’s record.

I thought this piece on The People’s View was excellent and perhaps should be required reading this year. Excellent analysis and great strategies plus information for answering challenging questions. I especially liked his comments on active listening and how to deal with Ron Paul supporters. I’m printing out a copy for myself.

Hi Mary, thanks for sharing this excellent article from The People’s View (TPV). Tien Le is one of the most brilliant writers at TPV. She reminds me of our President. She is smart, measured, analytical, yet fiercely devoted to pragmatic progressive solutions that improve the lives of people. In all her posts she provokes the reader to think through issues and focus on what is attainable. Like the President, Tien Le’s writing treats the reader as a mature adult. In my opinion, all the posts at TPV, led by the brilliant Deaniac, should be required reading for every one who is interested in thorough discussions of critical issues that the Obama administration has been dealing with. The Economic analyses at TPV are simply the best. In addition, TPV is also a place where posters are very fearless in challenging and debunking the manufactured lies of the PL and the emoprogs.

Probably not many given Romney only polls at around 25%. No way he gets over 40% – but it does show that Santorum could rocket to the lead if the Evangelical community rallies around him – did orders go out after weekend services?

It’s almost as if Paul and Romney split the non-Evangelical vote, and the others are all splitting the 60%. It just matters on how Bachmann, Gingrich and Perry crater at this point.

It’s unfortunate the GOP caucus isn’t run like the Dems, with the many voting rounds and those under 15% kicked off the next ballot. Santorum would have easily won with over 50% under the Dem system.

The entire MSM is shilling for Romney. They don’t want Obama to win in a blowout. Mark Halperin recited Romney talking point about “the Obama economy” as if Obama created it. Dick Gregory said that “Romney talks about policies for the middle class.” All these assholes want to do is have a close election because it makes their ratings better. They’ll be surprised when Obama starts campaigning.

January 02, 2012 4:30 PM
It seems to me, he lives his life with a finger in the wind
By Steve Benen

Byron York had an interesting report the other day on the process Mitt Romney went through before running for the Senate. He noted, for example, that the Massachusetts Republican traveled to Salt Lake City in 1993 in order to brief several leaders of his church about the policy positions he intended to take.

That in itself may prove controversial, and raise questions about Romney’s appreciation for the church-state line.

But before he did even that, Romney took a poll.

How Romney handled that dilemma is described in a new book, “Mitt Romney: An Inside Look at the Man and His Politics,” by Boston journalist Ronald Scott. A Mormon who admires Romney but has had his share of disagreements with him, Scott knew Romney from local church matters in the late 1980s.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid managed to win more than half of the filibuster-breaking votes on the Senate floor in 2011, besting his success rate from the previous year. Of the 32 cloture votes pushed by the Nevada Democrat this year, Reid won 19, or 59 percent. He lost 13 cloture votes. Sixty votes are needed to cut off debate and kill a filibuster, or invoke cloture. Reid’s majority shrunk from 59 Senators in 2010 to 53 in 2011, increasing the number of Republicans needed to vote with the majority of Democrats in order to reach the 60-vote threshold.

Although there were some legislative results in 2011, there were also some notable failures in which filibusters kept the Senate from acting, particularly on nominations.The White House and Democrats were dealt blows on four nominations that failed to win cloture votes: Mari Carmen Aponte to be ambassador to El Salvador, Richard Cordray to be director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Caitlin Halligan to join the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and Goodwin Liu to join the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Okay, I just tried to read Andrew Romano’s piece, and had to give it up after a page; the smarmy snarkiness was a bit too much. Call me old-fashioned, but I like reporters to report, not write like they’re tweeting to their frat buddies.

If he can, I hope he does. No more games. However I suspect McConnell will block it procedurally. McConnell was threatening to block every nominee that isn’t recess appointed before they left for christmas break – basically said “here is a block we’re ready to vote on, but if you recess appoint, we’ll block all of them” so maybe McConnell knows he can’t block a one second recess.

Pres Obama should definitely recess appoint Cordray and two labor board members – the latter the GOP is blocking so it couldn’t have enough for a quorum and thus inoperable for all of 2012. Any nominee/appointee that has been on the sidelines for a year I’d recess appoint as well – anybody that helps government run more efficiently I’d recess appoint. And then I’d dare the GOP to make a stink about it.

Cheryl Andrist, one of the local county coordinators for United Wisconsin, the state group heading up the recall effort for Walker and Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch: “We’re over 600,000 (signatures statewide)… We’re sure even though we haven’t been officially told that… [T]here are people coming in who are Republican, who voted for (Walker), independents, young, old. It’s a broad spectrum of citizens who are upset over something,”

With the recall effort, recent conversations at the state level have revolved around fictitious names on petitions and the legality of signing a petition multiple times. Andrist said the Rhinelander office hasn’t encountered any names that are obviously fake (i.e. Mickey Mouse), but there have been a few duplicate names discovered. “We have caught duplicates, but it’s miniscule considering how many signatures have gone through the office,” Andrist said. She said there have been cases of people coming in saying that they signed a petition, but didn’t know the circulator and were worried their signature wouldn’t be counted.

I am with you gobrooklyn! I love Michelle, but I am convinced that President Barack Obama is the best President in my lifetime. He has definitely earned the right to be re-elected. I don’t mind Michelle Obama in 2016, or 2020. She will be 52 and 56 respectively. Compare that to all these other Republicans some of whom are in their late fifties (Santorum, Bachmann); or in their late 60’s (Mitt, Newt, Jon); or, in the case of Ron Paul in his late 70’s.

Rep. Mike Kelly (R-Pa.), who made his living selling Chevys at a dealership founded by his father, last week introduced legislation that would end the $7,500 tax credit for people who purchase plug-in electric cars like GM’s Chevy Volt.

“This is not to say I don’t support the development of electric cars,” Kelly said in December. “I do, but not at taxpayer expense.”

Segregation in sports was voluntary, Ron Paul? For real? You can kiss.my.gumbo!~

In 1947, a major breakthrough of the color line in sports occurred when Jackie Robinson, a 28-year-old African-American ballplayer and war veteran, was brought up from the minor leagues to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers. The nation was divided at first. Many whites and nearly all blacks applauded the move and said it was long overdue. But a large number of whites, including many major league baseball players, objected to his presence. Robinson knew that his presence on the playing field would cause resentment. He anticipated that some pitchers would aim pitches at his head and that other players would try to injure him on the basepaths.

(One Southern player, Enos “Country” Slaughter of the St. Louis Cardinals, spiked Robinson particularly brutally, causing a seven-inch gash.) Ballplayers and fans would shout epithets of “******” at him when he came to bat. He also was aware that a few rabid racists might try to kill him — or at least scare him with death threats. But despite all of these pressures, Robinson played extremely well. He was a solid hitter, an outstanding base stealer, and he excelled defensively. He handled the pressure well even though at times he felt like exploding. The SPORTING NEWS, a newspaper that had opposed blacks in the major leagues, gave Robinson its first Rookie of the Year Award in 1947; the award was renamed in Robinson’s honor in 1987.

According to my daddy, ( a reliable source if there ever was one :lol: ) there other black players as good as, if not better than Jackie Robinson. Robinson was chosen because he was a great ballplayer, but also because he was handsome and even tempered. Other players like Satchell Paige and Josh Gibson were just as good, but thought to not have been willing to put up with the shit that Jackie put up with.

Oh, by the way, Ron Paul is a racist, sexist, homophobic, ignorant, hateful, mean, old man.

You are exactly right. There were many excellent players in the Negro League. However, Jackie Robinson did have the temperament to keep his eye of the prize. I often think of him in comparison to President Obama regarding his temperament. The President never becomes distracted with the racism or the nonsense. He is probably the most focused person I have ever seen in my life.

Yardarm, my daddy let me love baseball without telling me the racist history of the Philadelphia Phillies. As I grew older, he said that there was time to talk about that when I was a little older. I’m glad that he did that; I love the game. But, just like I love the United States, there was, and still is, an ugly side to it. I’m glad to see some of the youngun’s embrace the Negro Leagues history. I know, some of them just wear the jackets for the cool patches, but there are many who really get into the history and the sport of it.

Oh how my daddy would have loved this President. Computers were just coming out when he died. I’m sure he’s on TOD in heaven!!! He taught me that until we can openly talk about the ugly, the mean, the cruel, we will never to be able to acknowledge it and move beyond it. What was that quote (I’m about to murder?)… Something like “Hate can’t drive out hate, only love can drive out hate.”

On that note, Ron Paul is a racist, sexist, homophobic, ignorant, hateful, mean, old man. 8)

Sorry to hear about your Dad. I would have loved to sit and chat with him and talk about the old days. We could have probably had a “high old time” swappin’ tales.
Know this though. Getting “Negroes” in baseball was, as always, an economic decision. It was based on increasing ticket sales and filling the grandstands. It was a successful attempt to siphon off the dollars AA’s were spending with the Negro leagues.

yardarm756, with “these people” it seems as though it is always about the mean green…historically, money has always been “their” motivation for “change” or whatever….it money is to be made, “they” will figure out how to stomach whatever they have to.

Isonprize, I agree with you with 100%! All this nonsense about property rights and individual liberties is nothing more than an effort to mask Paul’s beliefs in white supremacy. Any business licensed by the state to serve the public should not, and must not, engage in race discrimination, or any other types of discrimination. Just as any business licensed by the state should not ,and must not, engage in practices that do not serve the public good, such as health. Ron Paul’s position that the rights of property trump the rights of equality only makes sense if you subscribe to the doctrine of white supremacy. The fact that there are people who claim to be progressives who support this racist, Ron Paul, tells you all you want to know about their priorities. Certainly their priorities do not include the promotion of equal treatment under the law of all citizens, regardless of race, gender, ethnicity, age, and sexual orientation.

PJ, I may be wrong but I don’t think Ron Paul is stupid or ignorant. I think people like Ron Paul still subscribe to the views voiced by the Supreme Court Chief Justice, Roger B. Tanney, who, in the 1857 infamous Dred Scott decision, declared that Black people “had no rights which whites were bound to respect.” The same Chief Justice, representing the majority of the Justices, also ruled that slaves (Africans) were property, and that slave owners had the right to take their slave property any where in the United States, including the territories. The people who call themselves progressives, and who are now supporting Ron Paul, overtly and covertly, are people who care less about the rights of Black people. Ron Paul opposed, and still opposes, the 1964 Civil Rights Act. I bet he also opposes the 1954 Supreme Court’s decision in “Brown v. Board of Education.” If that is the kind of person who is admired by the neo-progressives, then please count me out of the progressive movement.

Watching my recording of Rev. Al’s show. Hard to know what to dislike more … the comment from Santorum that only includes “blacks” as benefiting from welfare and SSI … the lesser being Romney’s bashing of the President … or having to look at an image of Gingrich’s fake silver hair next to the fake blonde hair of the Stepford wife standing with him – he spouting belligerent lies and she shaking her helmet head haircut in agreement.

Although I tried to end with a joke, there is nothing funny about any of this. Work hard in 2012, folks!

Did you tape it or is the whole show online somewhere? I have managed to see all except Stephen Colbert and Elmo introducing Yoyo Ma. and the Sonny Rollins tribute including the Bill Cosby introduction.

Republican policies are never discussed unless it is stopping Democratic policies. Whenever I ask any of my few Republican friends what policies their candidates have for jobs their only respnse is to begin bashing PBO. Willard says in his stump speech that he does love his family and country. Maybe that is enough for them.

I decided to watch Matthews today just to see if the policies and solutions to fixing this economy were going to be discussed. I only hear discussions about who is most conservative. My question is, what kind of solutions are they offering for what they are criticizing PBO?

More like What policies? Just same ol same ol. No regulation, kill Obamacare, war with Iran, keep troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, listen to the commanders, cut taxes, make the poor pay more, privatize Medicare and Social Security, (we call it killing the programs) and honor the so called job creators with everything they want. Oh, ya How about the corporations are people, my friend. Of course they are they make money. Willard is the best after all he spent his life creating wealth for the 1% in the job killing Bain Company.

And so I asked Congressman Paul: if he were President of the United States during World War II, and as president he knew what we now know about the Holocaust, but the Third Reich presented no threat to the U.S., would he have sent American troops to Nazi Germany purely as a moral imperative to save the Jews?

And the Congressman answered: “No, I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t risk American lives to do that. If someone wants to do that on their own because they want to do that, well, that’s fine, but I wouldn’t do that.”

Paul then looked at me, and I politely thanked him for his time. He smiled at me again and nodded his head, and many of his young followers were also smiling, and nodding their heads in agreement. Clearly, I was the only one in the room who was disturbed by his response.

I think Doug Ross asked the wrong question to a white supremacist anti-semite, Ron Paul. Here is a question I would ask Ron Paul: “If you were President of the United States, and Black South Africans, with the help of China, embarked on systematic killing of all whites in South Africa, would you send U.S. troops to stop the genocide “purely as a moral imperative to save white South Africans?” I bet you Ron Paul would say YES!

“He is only for marriage of one man and one woman and would enforce the federal Defense of Marriage Act,” Rev. Glen E. Bandel, Pastor of the Nora Springs Christian Church, said in one such release. The Washington Examiner’s Phillip Klein also reports that the campaign is distributing flyers attacking President Obama’s “assault on marriage.” […]

In an interview with TPM, Christopher J. Neuendorf, pastor of Holy Cross Evangelical Lutheran Church in Davenport, Iowa described this “liberty” as Paul’s chief selling point.

“We’ve typically approached abortion with the idea that we have to have a Republican in office, no matter how bad he is, so he can appoint conservative justices to the Supreme Court, so eventually 10 or 20 years from now we can overturn Roe v. Wade,”he said. “But Ron Paul has cosponsored legislation to restrict the jurisdiction of federal courts so they could not forbid states from criminalizing abortion. We could move much more quickly.”

Please read the rest…then send it to the assholes that THINK he talks of personal liberty. My dying ass.

WOW, some heavy stuff is going down on twitter. John Cole just weighed in on the side of GG in yesterday’s brawl about PBO. Everyone is attacking him and ABL just said, take me off your masthead. So it looks like people are drawing lines in the sand. Ugly and real.

John Cole???? God, that’s so disappointing. Actually, beyond disappointing for someone who’s been a strong Obama supporter. What GiGi said was inexcusable — and he makes it even worse by saying that it wasn’t a “joke”, but a serious critique of Obama supporters. But, cursorily knowing Cole, the attacks will just make him dig in. The self-righteousness is unfortunately strong in him.

It’s always these “once upon a time republican” that are causing all of this nonsense…me think they are really repubs with the sole priority to upset us…it is hard to ignore them, especially when they say mean-spirited, hurtful and harmful statements like the one gi gi made recently, but I thin we should try very hard to not that this craziness get under our skin…stay strong my TOD family!!! PRESSON!

Arthur Schlesinger on the Professional Left… in 1949. h/t ABL and smartypants.

The weakness of impotence is related to a fear of responsibility – a fear, that is, of making concrete decisions and being held to account for concrete consequences. Problems are much simpler when viewed from the office of a liberal weekly than when viewed in terms of what will actually happen when certain ideologically attractive steps are taken.

Too often the Doughface really does not want power or responsibility. For him the more subtle sensations of the perfect syllogism, the lost cause, the permanent minority, where lie can be safe from the exacting job of trying to work out wise policies in an imperfect world.

Politics becomes, not a means of getting things done, but an outlet for private grievances and frustrations. The progressive once disciplined by the responsibilities of power is often the most useful of all public servants; but he, alas, ceases to be a progressive and is regarded by all true Doughfaces as a cynical New Dealer or a tired Social Democrat.

Republicans across Iowa are bracing for trouble on Tuesday, concerned that caucus sites will be the next stop for the Occupy protesters who’ve staged demonstrations and disruptions at election events across the state.

Occupy leaders say they’re not planning to interfere with the voting, though they expect actions leading up the vote at candidates’ headquarters and afterward at victory parties. But even if 99 percent of the 99 percenters comply, the prospect of scattered protesters inciting confrontations with Republican voters has people from both camps on edge.

I believe they’re talking about a brokered convention where Romney, Not Romney and Paul will not have enough votes for the nomination so both Romney and Not Romney would look to Paul to turn over his delegates to give them the win and nomination and what Paul could get out of the trade.

O/T, but I need your help…..actually a friend needs your help. She has a long-time friend from Iowa who sent her a recording of a caller on the Mark Levine show. The caller was Jeff from Chicago……was driving home (to Chicago)….had been to a meeting in DC with some friends who are all neurosurgeons, as is he. It was a meeting for them to learn about “Obama’s health care reform” and how it will affect them as neurosurgeons. He explained he/they “learned” the following: Advanced neurological care will NOT be available for anyone over 70 years of age……in order to do surgery (get approved), the surgeon would need approval from an Ethics Panel and he kept saying that he was sure he or any other surgeon could not assemble that panel at 2 a.m. He pointed out couple of times that people are not called patients, they are called units. Levine kept asking him if this paper/info was from HHS and he said yes, but admitted it was not available for the “regular” individual’s reading. At one point, Levine said, “So, Sarah Palin was right……there will be death panels.” Caller agreed. Levine thanked and thanked him for calling and for the “very important information.”

I told my friend I would share on ‘my’ blog and ask for feedback. One thing I pointed out to her is that there is no way to know WHEN this call occurred, but my bet is that it was in 2009 during the debate……bet it was not recent. Anyway, my friend would like to be able to respond to this friend, but wants factual info or she won’t respond. Thanks for any assistance you all can offer.

Why don’t you just call The Dept of Health and Human Services in DC…tell them what happened, and ask if there is anyone there that can answer that for you. Horse’s mouth…otherwise, that’s how rumors start :) 1-877-696-6775

Not to dismiss your concerns, but this is a bunch of baloney. Someone said that someone said that someone said,,,,,,,,And if this did indeed occur, it sounds like some of the outrageous tactics that were used to scare during the health care debate—–the Palin Death Panels etc. If something sounds so far out, so impossible, so nonsensical, so unlike President Obama—–it’s just another effort to instill fear, along the lines of “Obama’s coming to get your guns and your Bibles! BOO!” And I’m suspicious of anyone who would even pretend to believe and spread this kind of junk. Motives? People need to use their noggins.

Agree. This friend who is asking for my help tends to “go off the deep end” when she gets emails, etc. I always try to help….provide her with factual info that she can pass on, but I always tell her if it seems totally outrageous, it usually is! Interesting thing is, she is an attorney in Northern Virginia. she really should know better than to “buy in” to all this junk.

The “not providing care after 70″ was the 1st red flag for me. There is no age limit to care. There are plenty of 70 year old in GREAT physical shape. Why would someone arbitrarily pick 70 years old as the cut-off for neurological care?

2nd red flag was “2am in the morning” If emergency surgery is needed, decisions are made no matter what time of day. If it’s a planned procedure, decisions are not made at 2 in the morning.

3rd red flag. Patients vs. units. Has nothing to do with anything. Hell, in war, people are called “collateral damage”

4th red flag. Not available to “regular” people. Well if it was classified information, WHY WAS HE TALKING ABOUT IT? Doesn’t speak much for the ethics of this “surgeon” does it. As an attorney, your friend should know a thing or two about information that is confidential.

Stop the madness. This is BS, plain and simple. Now if your friend, the attorney, wants to believe BS, that is her right. If she goes off the deep end on stuff, she’ll believe whatever anyone says. And yes, you are correct. She SHOULD know better than to buy into this junk.

You have more patience than I. I would be spending my time registering new voters, making phone calls, and working with people to organize more voter turnout for Pres. Obama.

Smart woman like that…one would expect she would have logical, critical thinking skills. No matter…I think that if you call and pass the message along to your friends…you should be ok. Maybe they can send some literature to you :)

This may help. I’ve included excerpts from the article but you can probably find more on the site itself. Check under the section entitled, Improving Coordination and Access to Care. There is NO rationing and seniors are NEVER denied services!

Impact of the Affordable Care Act on Seniors and Medicare before Committee on Ways and Means United States House of Representatives

The Patients’ Bill of Rights gives millions of Americans important new health insurance protections. For example, insurers can no longer cancel coverage when individuals get sick just because they made a mistake with their paperwork. Insurers can also no longer put lifetime dollar limits on essential benefits – limits that often meant coverage was gone when people needed it most. By 2014, most annual dollar limits on essential benefits will be a thing of the past.

Increased support for primary care: Thanks to the Affordable Care Act, physicians have better incentives to provide vital primary care services to Medicare beneficiaries. The Affordable Care Act, beginning January 1, 2011, provides for a new 10 percent bonus payment for primary care services furnished by a primary care practitioner and for major surgical procedures furnished by a general surgeon in a health professional shortage area. Primary care practitioners of family medicine, internal medicine, geriatric medicine or pediatric medicine, as well as general surgeons, nurse practitioners, clinical nurse specialists, and physician assistants could be eligible to receive this new incentive.

Glenn Greenwald made a vile remark yesterday that involved people being loyal to POTUS and rape and Angry Black Lady. There was an uproar that included a lot of people defending ABL and putting down Greenwald for his vile remarks. Tonight, John Cole jumped into the fray after it had died down and he knocked people for being so sensitive to the rape remarks, which prompted a whole new wave of remarks. It’s UGLY. I’m sure there will be a chirpstory sooner or later. We’ll post here.

Ya know, part of me is like – who cares what some random dude says about me/to me on a blog or twitter? The comment about raping a nun was obviously bizarre and rude. The person who sent it is a bomb thrower. Greenwald is a bomb thrower. I kind of wish people would ignore him…he’s got his position on things and he’s got a job to do…there’s always going to be an agenda with bloggers.

However, I think NDAA is a flawed bill. I think people saying that the president is going to throw everyone in detention forever and for whatever reason he wants, are lying and giving a flawed argument against the bill. I wish there was a way for us supporters to push back on the flawed arguments, while acknowledging that the detention provisions and those similar parts of the bill are problematic.

I agree. One of the failings of the general MSM is that they refused to police each other and call others out for blatant dishonesty, even the so-called liberal voices. Sure, they’ll attack Fox News, but how often will they call their own side* out on BS? So I do appreciate that “random bloggers” aren’t just allowed to spread lies without pushback, and at this point that’s what it is. This stuff gets passed around via social media, so just because it doesn’t make it onto cable news doesn’t mean that poison isn’t still causing damage.

*I do not, however, consider the likes of Greenwald as on our side. Unfortunately, he is perpetuated as being that, another distortion that needs to be laid to waste.

Hey Everyone,
I put this on the last thread but it was after Chipsticks started this one so forgive me for reposting. I just got started on Twitter this weekend and I think I follow all of you who are there. Please follow back – it would be much appreciated! I can’t beleive people have thousands of followers. LOL I’m still trying to get to 200. Thanks much and Happy New Year! #4MoreObama!!

Brad Woodhouse really schooled Chris Jansing. She was dutifully spouting the GOP talking points and wringing her hands about President Obama going negative against Mitt Romney. Apparently, the feckless media thinks its negative when President Obama points out the facts about about Mitt Romney. Brad Woodhouse explained the situation to Chris Jansing by stating the obvious……….

IT’S NOT ABOUT BEING NEGATIVE, IT’S ABOUT SETTING THE RECORD STRAIGHT.

I saw Joan Walsh on Ed. Her comments were ok until she aid that the media was in love with PBO during the 2008 campaign. I guess he is talking about the same media that looped the Rev. Wright controversy 24/7 for at least a month everyday all day.

I saw Andrea Mitchell on the nightly news “interviewing” Bachman I couldn’t believe when Bachman said Ron Paul was dangerous, stupid Andrea asked if he was “more dangerous” than the President, of course she couldn’t even use his title. Why don’t these idiots just admit they are all working for the GOP. how dare a “journalist” ask something like that?

Isn’t it amazing how the perception in GOP world is so skewed. Wait, let me get this straight.If the Prez and his admin correct the untruths, it is perceived as going negative,but if the lying Willard Romney does it against the Prez it is perceived as what exactly??? Huh?
Sorry, but I can’t even pretend to understand the logic here!

President Obama has made arming Washington’s allies in the Middle East and Asia a key facet of his foreign policy, breaking with decades of Democratic practice, says a prominent defense analyst.

Over the last few months of 2011, the Obama administration inked deals to send U.S fighter jets and other systems to several key allies in the Asia-Pacific region and the Middle East. Those transactions have been labeled by analysts as hedges against China’s military build up and an increasingly aggressive Iran.

Loren Thompson, chief operating officer of the Lexington Institute, in a Monday Forbes.com piece, called the administration’s arms sales “a striking departure from the ideological preferences of the post-Vietnam Democratic Party.”

A rape survivor comments on GG’s tweets….hard to read, but not impossible…even with my bad eyes. Rape is a crime of violence against another. End of conversation. What he said was inexcusable, and he should be fired. From ALL his jobs.

Now with several million bucks in the bank, Newt Gingrich vows in Iowa to go nasty in New Hampshire — thereby better positioning himself in South Carolina — and nobody does nasty like Newt:

I probably should have responded faster and more aggressively. If somebody spent $3.5 million lying about you, you have some obligation to come back and set the record straight….. And so I think New Hampshire is a good place to start the debate for South Carolina.

Oh, the lovefest from the debates are over I assume. If Newt had not spent so much time blaming the media at the debates maybe he would not have fallen so quickly. Tweety did a pretty good “let me finish” segment knocking Romney in a subtle way about all of the nasty ads against Newt while he was being all above the fray. I have spent this evening laughing at all of this crowd. :)

farewell first family! when you return to us next december, we’ll all be celebrating your winning another four years in office. hope you’re rested and refreshed, and ready to lead us forward, in hope and with determination.
aloha oe
a hui hou